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June 7, 2011

G60: Red Sox 6, Yankees 4

Jacoby Ellsbury slammed Freddy Garcia's fifth pitch of the evening deep into the right-center bleachers for his 7th home run of the year. Dustin Pedroia walked, Adrian Gonzalez tripled (!) and Kevin Youkilis delivered a sac fly. Boston led 3-0 after only 15 pitches.

Lester (6-8-3-1-5, 112) threw 53 pitches in the first two innings, but was not seriously threatened, despite the pronouncements of impending doom from both Don Orsillo (TV) and Dave O'Brien (radio). Lester left the bases loaded in the first, allowed a two-out single in the second, gave up a leadoff single in the third but did not allow the runner to advance, stranded two in the fourth, and one in the fifth. His only 1-2-3 inning was the sixth.

Lester has received credit for a win in his last five starts against the Yankees (dating back to May 2010). It's the longest streak since Roger Clemens had five from June 1986 to June 1988. The club record is eight, by Tex Hughson (1942-43); Bill Lee had seven.

David Ortiz crushed a no-doubt, two-run dong (#14) in the fifth to give the Sox a 6-1 lead (which is also Boston's record against the MFY this season) and although New York answered with two runs in their half of the inning, there was not much real worry. After the Sox's lead was cut to 6-3, the Yankees brought the potential tying run to the plate only once - and that was the final batter of the game, Alex Rodriguez, who struck out against Jonathan Papelbon.

Bobby Jenks took over for Lester and threw only four pitches to Jorge Posada to start the seventh before having to leave the game because of back pain/tightness. ... Mark Teixeira was hit flush on the right knee by a pitch in the first inning and left the game in considerable pain. X-rays were negative.

Hector Noesi threw six innings of relief for the Yankees. It's not as rare as I thought.

The victory puts the Red Sox (34-26) into a first place tie with the Yankees (33-25), though New York's winning percentage is actually .002 better than Boston's. We'll deal with that tomorrow.

PYTH is each team's expected record, based on their runs scored and runs allowed.

The Post's George King writes: "Welcome to the real start of the baseball season." King says these games mean "a lot more than the seventh, eighth and ninth games of the season did."

But do they mean more than the 38th, 39th, and 40th games of the season, i.e., Boston's three-game sweep in the Bronx on May 13-15? King grudgingly mentions those games, in which the Yankees were 3-for-22 (.136) with RATS, towards the end of his article. Anyway, no matter when the games are played, each one "means" the same thing in the standings. Perhaps King means the anticipation is higher for this series.

Mike Lupica says this series is the start of "baseball summer ... a perfect time to find out what it looks like when the Red Sox are finally playing the way they are supposed to and the Yankees are doing the same."

The Red Sox are 5-1 against the Yankees in 2011, out-hitting them .292 to .216 and posting a better ERA, 3.67 to 5.37. ... Alex Rodriguez is only 6-for-29 (.207) against Lester, but has two doubles and three home runs. ... Among David Ortiz's 11 hits against Garcia are four doubles and three homers.

On this date in 2007, Curt Schilling was one out away from a no-hitter when Oakland's Shannon Stewart singles to right field. Schilling completes his one-hit, 1-0 win two pitches later.

Long time reader of your blog, but I've never posted before. I just wanted to thank you for your review of Knocking on Heaven's Door. My wife recently got it for me for my birthday, and I have been thoroughly enjoying it.

Nationals prospect Bryce Harper blew a kiss toward Greensboro Grasshoppers (Marlins) pitcher Zachary Neal after hitting a home run off him on Monday. ... Harper better not dig in too deep the next time he faces Neal (or any 'hopper pitcher), me thinks.

Allan I saw that Harper video on Jim Rome (which I never watch) today. Hilarious. Here's the quote:

"Check out my man, styling and admiring that shot like he’s Reggie Jackson or something. Needless to say, the pitcher Zach Neal doesn’t care how big Harper’s signing bonus was or that he was taken first overall; he didn’t like being shown up and let him Harper know it. So Harper blew him a kiss. Can’t wait until he tries that with Kyle Farnsworth or (Brett Myers). ...You just went yard on some dude from the Greensboro Grasshoppers not Tim Lincecum in the NLCS. If pulling that garbage in the low minors doesn’t fly it’ll probably get you killed in the majors.

Nothing like a Single A style job. Because if you can’t check yourself, and your manager and teammates can’t, the game will."

Some Yanks games are on "My9," usually Friday night, but they'll show special games like Sox. Same announcers and everything, but just a chance for non-cable people to see a game. (Like the Red Sox were doing with Fox 25 until they finally went all NESN)

I'm genuinely glad that early scans of Teixeira's knee are negative. I remember back in the days when I was actually a physically active human being I had a few incidents where I hit my kneecap and ended up writhing on the ground for minutes afterwards. Hopefully today's incident was similar to my experiences, putting aside the fact that he's a high-profile multi-millionaire of course. The bastard.

I find any live sport fun. I'm not a basketball fan at all, but the few games I've gone to (either women's pro or men's college), I've really enjoyed. I *hate* football, but the two NFL games I've been to, I had a great time. But I'd do just about anything rather than watch a football game on TV.

I have only been to one Celtics game and one Bruins game, and both times I was appalled at the constant noise and gimmicky stuff that goes on every time there's a pause in the play. Not so much because I hate the noise - and I do hate it - but because I fear it creeping into baseball.

Even watching sports I know nothing about, it's so distracting. The hockey game was actually a good game - why not let us appreciate the beauty of whatever sport it is.

Laura, I find the kicks, passes and head shots aesthetically pleasing in soccer. That being said, I do not think I have ever watched an entire soccer game. Except when my daughter played, and that was NOT pretty! :)

Hockey for me is the ultimate back and forth, back and forth---even worse because nothing much happens until...BOOM! Score! and then it's over before I even saw it. Skating is nice, but not in circles over and over.

The thing I hate more than any of these sports is when people try to make a case for a certain sport being superior to any other - not that they like it more, but that the sport itself is somehow objectively better. As if it's something you could prove.